This day in 1914 in The Record

“The absence of news concerning the progress of the European war is to-day most marked,” The Record reports on a front page filled with war news.

Specifically, reporters are learning very little about a major battle on the war’s western front, except that French and British armies are retreating from advancing German forces.

“It is evident that there is a concerted effort on the part of both the English and the French authorities to keep the world at large in absolute ignorance of what is transpiring in northern France,” our paper claims, “This veil of secrecy drawn tighter to-day than at any time during the last forty days may be taken as an indication that events of importance are transpiring.”

Meanwhile, Abbie G. Temple, a drawing instructor for the Lansingburgh public schools, has returned to Troy from Montreal after journeying across western Europe during the past month.

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“We witnessed sights that we shall probably never see again, and we had some thrilling times,” Temple says in an interview for tomorrow’s paper.

Temple’s party was in Italy when the war broke out at the end of July. “Not being able to read the Italian newspapers we could not find out much about the trouble,” she tells our reporter, “The air was full of rumors, however, but we did not think much about the matter until we reached Switzerland.”

Switzerland is neutral in the current conflict, but Temple witnessed her hotel staff in Lagonia rush from the building for border patrol duty at one point. Despite a warning from the local British consulate Temple and friends continued into France, reaching Paris on August 14.

Starved and exhausted after a 28 hour trip, Temple found “the city that we had heard so much about and where there is always so much life … as quiet as a country village.” Knowing French, she got up to speed on the war by reading Paris papers. During her 36 hours in the capital she saw searchlights probing for German airships, but no military action.

Temple traveled by train to Boulogne via Amiens, where “we came face to face with the horrors of war, witnessing the dead and wounded French soldiers being brought from Belgium….We saw many pathetic sights, of relatives seeing their loved ones brought back dead, and we were glad to get away.”

From Boulogne Temple sailed to London and traveled to Glasgow, where she booked passage on the steamship Letitia. On August 31 she reached Montreal, where a military draft is in progress and “the general opinion [is] that the war would last a long time.”